[MEncoder-users] Top Field First (MPG to XVID AVI)

[Mike Brickman]

I am converting UK DVB TV programmes recorded on my MediaPortal PVR (initially converted from TS files using VideoReDo3) to XVID AVI.  These are interlaced with top field first, but mencoder always creates the AVI file with the interlacing flagged (incorrectly) as Bottom Field First.  This may be fine for home movies as digital camera's seem to use BFF and also I believe NTSC uses BFF, but PAL DVB and PAL DVDs are TFF.  I can find no way of altering this behaviour within MENCODER so am resorting to using MPEG4Modifier to change the interlacing flag once the AVI file has been created - this requires additional unwelcome processing time.

A typical conversion job looks something like:

mencoder -o target.av  -force-avi-aspect 1.778 -oac copy -ovc xvid -xvidencopts fixed_quant=4:interlacing:aspect=16/9 source.mpg

I would be delighted if anyone can tell me how I can get mencoder to either automatically respect the setting contained in the mpg file or allow me to override the default BFF setting.

Thanks in advance.